Japan Spring 2024

I’ve been in Japan for 10 night, 3 night in Tokyo, 2 night in Fujikawaguchiko, 2 night in Osaka, 2 night in Kyoto and 2 night in Nagoya, most of it was spend in sightseeing, I’ve learned so much about Japan’s culture that I really respect of, eat a lot of good food, drink all kind of water, from non alcoholic to alcoholic one and appreciate the infrastructure.

Japan is one of the most visited countries in Asia, which when I came, it’s on Sakura blooming season and on a few weeks where a lot of tourists visit, boosted by the weak Japanese yen. which result in hence when I go to Japan, I can see a lot of people from another country, which is somehow... easy to distinguish

I can see the infrastructure in Japan is designed by human to another human for the sake of better quality of life, always on time and almost everything is predictable. for example, my first impression of the country. The immigrations is self-service and automated to the last bit until there’s a need of human part (I really feel the difference and pain when I get back to my own country). the luggage is sorted tidy when the process is done, the public toilet is the best, there’s always a price tag on any item on a store, I almost don’t need to ask for things except if it contains some meat that some of my families don’t eat

The infrastructure, especially the train, I will compare it to Indonesia’s, and I can see there’s not much difference between how I̶n̶d̶o̶n̶e̶s̶i̶a̶'s̶  Jakarta's is (thanks to mr. Ignasius Jonan), I still can’t believe why our government don’t push public transport usage more. compared to Japan’s (any city mentioned above) Jakarta's train line is simpler without that many operators and terminal. Japan’s train station has multiple operators on the same stations and some big stations have a lot of platforms, we need to make sure which platform we’re supposed on. I believe Singapore’s MRT have better experiences and easier to navigate

The road .. is another story. it have no speed bump, there’s almost no traffic on some part of the country, walker is prioritized to cross the road, the sidewalk has no pothole and very clean. Contrast to what’s we have on my home country. Indonesia may have similar / better landscape than Japan, but the reason why Indonesia won’t become tourist destination like Japan is because how much it lack in infrastructure, the absurd domestic flight price, the lack of public transport coverage in most city and the extortion from “local people”

it’s interesting that “pungli” is translated to extortion by google, it indeed has the same meaning, should we just use “pemerasan” for that kind of behavior?)

Over tourism may be a good problem for Japanese to have (and solve), it’s nice to know that some Japanese understand basic English and very accommodating, especially on public facility like train station or high tourist area, but in my opinion, don’t expect too much, we might travel to some less remote area and the local might not understand English. So it’s better to also learn some basic Japanese with their proper pronunciation with google translate as backup (not the other way around).

The view out there is amazing, supported with great weather

There’s some fun fact about Japan that I learned while I was there

1. The hotel is amazing, the first hotel that I’m using look old from outside but the receptionist (owner(?)) is very helpful, they have everything on the bathroom, from shampoo, conditioner, soap, lotion to hair tonic(?). The second one provide large plastic bag
2. I understand why it’s a great weather when it’s clear blue sky, in my country, a clear blue sky means it’s hot and humid as hell
3. they have adult store, just .. search it on google maps ;)

Maybe some tips, to help future traveler

1. Google maps is your best friend, you can go anywhere with it
2. The train ticket is a “magnetic” card with all kind of form factor, don’t put it near any magnet or it will broke the ticket. fool me realize this after 3 day of broken ticket, the best thing is, not a single officer that standby there assume it’s my fault, they just let me pass after see my card expiry date. one of them actually help me change my card (which i broke the very next day)
3. I learned this late, but don’t eat or drink while walking
4. Take off your shoes indoor
5. Put your backpack on the front in the train
6. Don’t talk out loud (and on the phone), inside the train is the safe place for all people to rest, sleep or anything that don’t bother other people
7. Keep your trash, bring a small plastic to hold your trash, there’s not a lot of trash bin out there
8. Don’t suddenly stop when walking, let people walk fist, watch around when walking. Japanese sure do walk very fast (and I like it)
9. Check the weather forecast, prepare accordingly

Now, random picture drop